In 2013 I started the #convocoffee series on my blog. A monthly – then far less than monthly – link up. #convocoffee is where I met Kate. Back then she wrote the blog From Katie to Kate and I followed her stories and her dreams one linked post at a time.
Kate suffers from Usher syndrome. A condition that causes hearing loss and the eye disorder retinitis pigmentosa. While Kate was born deaf, it wasn’t until she was fifteen that her sight difficulties began to emerge.
Kate was told that she would be blind by the age of forty. And while that date has come and gone, Kate’s vision is deteriorating and the likelihood of science catching up with a break through before she is blind, does not seem likely.
Kate knows this, her husband and children know this and her heart knows this. The emotional burden of this fate is something very few of us would even understand. But Kate does not allow herself to be a burden. Instead she shines. An inspiration that once again tugged at my heart strings recently.
Scrolling through my Instagram feed I noticed a hashtag I had not seen before: #sunetsforkate. A tiny little voice inside my head said “that is Kate!” Yet logic said, Kate doesn’t write under that name, it can’t be her.
Well logic was wrong and after clicking through a few images I did come across the very same Kate. She now writes the blog Sunsets for Kate and the story behind the change could not be more moving.
A conversation with her husband about what she would regret the most when she does go blind, revealed that Kate wanted to see more sunsets, before she could not see them at all. When I read that I had to stop for a moment. Imagine never seeing a sunset. Imagine knowing that it wasn’t a possibility, but a matter of time.
#sunsetsforkate is Kate’s way to see the sunsets. People send in their sunsets, tag them on social media, write about them online, place a photo in her letterbox. Kate is receiving hundreds of sunsets. This post today, is one more of them.
I took this image driving down the highway on route from San Diego to Los Angeles. November last year. I caught my breath at how beautiful the moment was. Hubby driving down the freeway, kids asleep in the back. The moment was perfect, so much so, it almost didn’t seem real. I snapped the pic and sent it to two close people in my life. I simply said #californiadreaming. Today I share it with you #sunsetsforkate.
You see for me it is more than just pictures of sunsets. It is a person who has followed her dream. Her inner voice. Her inner calling. There is something truly powerful in that. Something we can all learn from. Just search the hashtag and you will see the hundreds of images streaming in. The hundreds of people connecting to Kate’s story. The hundreds of people finding a way to connect the sunsets to their own lives.
Kate once wrote “I vow never again to be living tomorrow before today. I will be present. Today.” Read that line out aloud to yourself. Let it sink in. How many of us live in tomorrow? Hustle and angst our way through today? Somehow by doing so, we miss both. Today and tomorrow. Isn’t about time we changed?
Please take a moment to click through and read Kate’s story. Take a moment to click through the hashtag on social media. More so, take a moment to share your own #sunetsforkate.
Kate, I enjoyed every single one of your linked up #convocoffee posts. But I think the post you never linked up, tore at my heart strings the most. Inspired me the most. I hope by sharing this story I can take your inspiration a little further, across one more person who doesn’t know it yet, but needs to remember how important our sunsets are. The sunsets of today xx Josefa
Linking up with #IBOT
Catch up on my last blog post Date Night, Every Night?
